Traditional lithophane pictorial works, often in the form of panels that can be hung in windows or in front of a light source, have been made of porcelain. Such a porcelain lithophane work is thin, translucent and has varying thickness such that, when viewed from the front while light passes through the work from the rear, a picture of extreme beauty and delicacy is provided. More particularly, the different thicknesses provide different shades of lightness and darkness. The thicker an area the darker that area will appear. The thinner an area the lighter that area will appear. The variation can go from very dark to very light. Changes can be sudden and dramatic or very gradual and subtle. Each such work has a contoured recessed front picture-providing surface that provides the varying thickness and thus the picture for that work.
To provide a porcelain lithophane work, initially a soft pattern is hand sculpted or carved by a craftsman/artist working with molding material such as wax. The wax is back-lighted so that the progress of the picture can be observed as the contour of the recessed front surface of the wax pattern is sculpted.
Then the wax pattern is used to create a plaster mold with a cavity with a contoured convex surface that is the reverse of the sculpted recessed front surface of the pattern. The plaster mold in turn is used to mold reproductions of the pattern, with each reproduction having the desired contoured recessed front surface. Initially an opaque slick or flowable slurry of porcelain-forming material is introduced into the plaster mold. The slurry must remain in the mold for a prolonged drying period, during which moisture from the slurry passes into the plaster mold. Finally the dried reproduction is removed from the mold and fired or baked in a high temperature oven to produce the final translucent picture-providing porcelain lithophane work. The resulting porcelain lithophane work is beautiful and valuable. However, it's creation is costly, time consuming and requires great skill.
It would be highly desirable to be able to create lithophane-type pictorial works or objects in a simple, quick and inexpensive manner.
It would be especially desirable to be able to control and limit the creating apparatus and process so that it can be used by those of low skill level and/or dexterity, such as young children. In this regard, the more that can be done by the children, without any or with very limited supervision, the more rewarding and exciting it will be for the children.
Similarly, because of children's short attention spans, it is highly desirable that they can see the results of their efforts just as quickly as possible and without extended delays as would be required to dry and/or fire the objects to complete them.